Teresa Mlawer was born in Havana, Cuba, and came to the United States in 1962. Teresa was a pioneer in the field of childrens and youth literature. She began translating childrens books from English to Spanish at a time when versions of childrens stories in English were sparse in Spanish.Teresa was one of the great women of the Spanish book industry: book seller, promoter of children and young adult books, distributor, and translator.